Feeling out of the loop after all that festive feasting? Here are some tasty morsels of restaurants news to get you back on track, including the latest openings and some must-try places for your To Do list.
Burns Night– While restaurants like St Pancras Grand and Albannach will be keeping things traditionally Scottish, Min Jiang will be celebrating with an Oriental twist on January 25th. Their ‘Chinese Burns Night’ menu (£55 per head) includes a whisky cocktail, their signature Beijing duck and a haggis dim sum platter.`
Burgers – Byron is set to launch a new 8oz premium burger developed with one of London’s finest butchers, Jack O’Shea. It will be available from Thursday 14th Janaury at their Soho, Chelsea, Kensington and Gloucester Road restaurants.
Michelin Stars – The Michelin guide will award its UK restaurant stars on January 19th and Bloomberg has published predictions from chefs like Jason Atherton, Pierre Koffman and Marcus Wareing. Of the 29 chefs interviewed, 11 tipped The Ledbury for a second star, with L’Anima and Texture also proving popular.
New Openings – Seventeen has brought smart Chinese food (from an ex-Ba Shan chef) to Notting Hill Gate and Chinatown’s Keelung has been rebranded as the Empress of Sichuan. Circus – an ‘entertainment-led’ restaurant – is now serving pan-American food in Covent Garden and Greg Wallace’s café come produce store opens on Thursday (14th Jan) in Putney.
Reopenings – With refurbishment work completed following a fire last year, Benares will reopen on January 18th. The dining room feels warmer and the restaurant now boasts a walk-in wine theatre and chef’s table overlooking the kitchen. Also on the 18th, Avenue will reopen under the leadership of new head chef Mikko Kataja (ex-Launceston Place and Orrery). The menu has been revamped to include modern British dishes like poached brill with leeks and stilton and spiced pear tart.
Hot Venues – The critics have fallen head-over-heels for the retro Brit dishes at Dean Street Townhouse, while Galvin La Chapelle and Kitchen W8 continue to impress our reviewers. Cheap eats are big business this month with Mooli’s winning over the Soho lunch crowd and the new Franco Manca settling comfortably into Chiswick. Tables are still hard to come by at end-of-2009 favourites like Hix, Polpo and Pizza East.
You can plan your culinary adventures for the year ahead with our regularly updated ‘Coming Soon’ list, which now includes Atul Kochhar’s Colony, Petrus, Pollen Street and Chipotle.
Probably old news to you guys but Byron is also coming to Canary Wharf, looking forward to sampling the 8oz burger there.
Passing by the site where its going to be (the old Chillis site), the hoardings are still up but from what I hear its due to open April time. I will definitely be making the time to visit,
Posted by: Wharfed | January 19, 2010 at 08:13 PM